


Across the Plains

by apple_pi



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, Hobbits, LOTR, gapfiller
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-05-28
Updated: 2009-05-28
Packaged: 2017-10-02 09:53:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apple_pi/pseuds/apple_pi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A gap-filler ficlet, set in <i>The Two Towers</i> as Merry and Pippin are swept toward Fangorn by the Uruk-hai.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Across the Plains

**Author's Note:**

> Written in drabbles; one double-drabble and a quarter-drabble at the very end. Some dialogue borrowed from Tolkien.

Pain.

In my ribs, and then nausea as my center of balance is thrown off. There's burning, and I struggle against it, kicking and flailing, it gets hotter and my head oh it _hurts_ -

I can hear suddenly, as though a door has opened to a crowded room. Maybe it's a party. I don't like it here - there's laughter but it is ugly and jeering and my head hurts so much, someone is holding me up by the hair like a ragdoll and my brow burns and there is a blinding dagger of agony before it goes numb.

Where am I?

~*~

My eyelids are sealed. I am dangled - ragdoll again - and then choking is added to the terror. What is this foulness? There is liquor, like another burn, but such nastiness within that my body convulses, rejecting it.

"Can't take his medicine!" an ugly voice cackles as I am shaken, and others shout and grate and whine and clap, hooting and snarling happily. Amid them there is another voice, high and sweet and as perfectly familiar as my own, a wordless protest on my behalf that ends as though cut off.

Pippin.

My heart contracts to a stone and I stop struggling.

~*~

I open my eyes and force my knees to lock, feeling the hand twist roughly in my hair and then release me.

"Hullo, Pippin." I try to raise one eyebrow but my brow hurts too awfully. "So you've come on this little expedition, too? Where do we get bed and breakfast?"

There's a sting of pride at my own quick wit, but also shame - it endangers us both. All we have left is despair and pride, though, and determination to make a good end of it here, together. For I see my own defiance echoed on Pippin's small, dirty face.

~*~

"Now then," says the orc who tended me. "None of that!" His voice growls on, threat and bluster and evil, and claws and teeth and sword to back them up. I lift my chin and meet Pip's eye, and it flickers between us again - gladness that we are neither of us alone, and a grim sort of stubbornness - hobbit-pride, my father would call it, though it is nonsensical that any hobbit should find himself in this situation. I hide my nausea and my chagrin from my cousin, and soon enough we are separated, climbing and then running, the whips at our heels.

~*~

My belly hurts as I run, so tightly is it twisted, willing not to hear any sound that bodes ill for Pippin, willing his feet to stay swift and steady, willing the sharp tongues of the whips from his heels.

All I can recall from before my awakening is my rage and grief at seeing him fall, my terror as Boromir sank to his knees. I recall the black orc blood running down my blade, making my hands slick, and how that excellent little sword stuck fast, finally, in one great-thewed leg. I recall a flash of white light. Pain.

~*~

There is a commotion. I know without thinking how that it is Pippin, the hue and cry of the goblins and his utter silence. I don't stop. At least these monsters with me must stay with me; they cannot seek him in the darkness and the mist.

I am halted by the expedient method of a hand in my hair, jerking me backward and off my feet so that I thud to the turf, breath gone. I expect a kick or the cut of the lash, but the orcs have other business; they mill around, shouting and growling and ugliness.

~*~

The earth is wet and soft beneath me. I hear Pippin again, an involuntary grunt that follows the crack of a whip, and I close my eyes. He did not escape.

"Enough!" snarls the voice of the leader. "He's still got to run a long way yet. Make 'em both run! Just use the whip as a reminder."

I'm dragged to my feet again, listening as the orc growls at my cousin. "But that's not all. I shan't forget. Payment is only put off." A shove at my back and my feet move. "Leg it!" he shouts, and we do.

~*~

What details are there of a run like that? Do you know that if you run long enough your mouth produces great quantities of saliva? It does. When we halt I bend over, spitting out endless thin, sticky strands of the stuff, drowning, gulping for air. The burn on my forehead fades to insignificance as I begin to burn from the feet upward. The grass and dirt are kind, soft and moist beneath the padding of my feet, but even that kindness skews to a mockery as the softness makes my ankles twist and ache. My shins splinter and crack, or so it feels, though when I squint at them they appear normal. A sharp band of agony tightens around my right knee, and the stitches in my side develop into great, terrible rents as my lungs labour and heave and struggle. Finally every muscle burns, burns, burns, burns, and I stumble, only to feel the sting of the lash. It is like a knife wound, numb and then another scalding pain added to those already consuming me.

When I fall I am dragged by the two orcs on either side of me, arms wrenched and feet trailing limply behind.

~*~

Night and night and night, and when I can run no more I am carried, bumping along like a sack at the back of a stinking goblin. I sink into evil dreams, now, and cannot see Pippin or remember why I had thought to come here, how I have come to be so close to death and yet still alive, waiting for an end that will doubtless be cruel and slow.

The sun rises, her face showing a dark smear of trees on the horizon. I am dropped to the ground and I lie still, hearing nothing and seeing less.

~*~

Another of the burning draughts is forced down my throat, spreading its heat through my limbs so I sit up, shivering hot and cold. I can see Pippin, his matted curls gripped by an orc who forces his bottle between his lips. I look down at the grey bread and meat that are tossed into my lap, and then up at the face of the goblin who gave them me. He is already gone, and I throw the meat away, devouring the bread and trying not to think of what creature gave its flesh to be food for these animals.

~*~

My head hurts. At least I'm not running now. Instead I dangle behind a great goblin, tied arms slung over his neck like a hobbit child riding pig-a-back. I jounce along and keep my gut from rebelling by sheer will; no matter how my body longs to vomit, the bread and liquor may be the last sustenance I get, and I will not waste them on the air. My shoulders ache and tingle with agony; when they go numb it is a relief. I sleep, or at least I think I sleep; there are dreams, in any case. Evil dreams.

~*~

When I awaken my legs are bound and Pippin's breath wafts sweet across my face. "Merry," he whispers.

"Pippin," I say, and open my eyes.

 

 

 

~_ end _~ 


End file.
